Passing of the Jedi
by Taylor Gillespie
Summary: The Jedi left over from the sudden change of the Republic to the Empire struggle to survive as the Jedi Purge begins...(work in progress)R


One

He didn't know how long he'd been running, but judging by how his breath came fast and sweat came streaming down his face, it had been a while. But it wasn't how long he had been running that troubled him; it was _who_ he was running from. _Why would they turn on us? _He wondered to himself as he stormed through a cluster of strange looking bushes, common in the thick, alien jungles of Felucia. Suddenly, a shot rang out, it was close. The Jedi stopped running and scanned the immediate area for signs of movement. Nothing. Feeling a disturbance in the Force, the Jedi's hand instinctively dropped to his lightsaber, he grasped the hilt, but did not unfasten it from his belt. _Crunch._

The Jedi spun to face the sound's point of origin, again, nothing was there. Something white caught his eye. _Snap-hiss. _The emerald green blade of the Jedi's lightsaber ignited and came around on the Clonetrooper's neck in a fraction of a second. Then he was surrounded. The remainder of the clone battalion rushed from all sides of the forest and opened fire. Quinlan Vos raised his saber in defense, deflecting as many shots as he could before calling on the Force to grant him speed. "Visual lost, prepare for continued jungle sear-." The trooper slumped to the ground, a large, red hot slash across his back. Quinlan Vos stood over the fallen trooper, lightsaber raised in one hand over his head in an aggressive stance. The troopers opened fire again. Simultaneously, Vos lowered his saber to deflect the oncoming laser bolts and began to charge the clones. A deflected shot found its way to a trooper and connected, sending the trooper falling backwards. Slicing through armor and flesh, Quinlan made short work of the remaining Clonetroopers. Standing over the heap of smoking bodies, Quinlan felt a tremor in the Force. _Aayla._ Without further thought, Vos called upon all the speed he had within him and tore towards the location of the tremor. Aayla Secura, Quinlan's former Padawan, had been assigned to Felucia as a General with a battalion of Clonetroopers, just as Vos had been. He caught sight of a clearing ahead. Ten Clonetroopers were in the clearing surrounding a blue skinned Twi'lek. Aayla had her lightsaber drawn, a look of disbelief on her face as the troops raised their weapons at her. The battalion's commander spoke up, "You are under arrest under the authority of Emperor Palpatine. Resistance will not be tolerated." Aayla ignited her lightsaber, "Or what?" she said defiantly. The trooper gave a signal. Aayla vaulted into the air as the clones opened fire, when she landed she deflected a bolt back to its source and cut a trooper down in a sweep of her blade. Quinlan took this opportunity to aid his former apprentice. Storming through the trees, Vos charged at the commander and took him out in a diagonal swipe. "Quin! You're okay!" Aayla said, relieved. "Let's keep it that way, alright?" Vos replied as he thrust his saber into a trooper's chest. Aayla half smiled at the sarcasm, despite their dire situation, "Got it." Both Jedi began to back up toward each other, deflecting blaster bolts as they went, a few connecting with clones, until they were back to back. Then, the troopers abruptly stopped firing. An AT-TE walker loomed over the troopers and the Jedi. "_Sirichtu_."Aayla cursed in her native Twi'leki at the sight of the walker.

The guns of the walker slowly pointed at the Jedi; and then they fired. Aayla and Quinlan sprung into the air at the same time, sailing over the laser cannon blasts of the AT-TE.

Corkscrewing through the air, both Jedi landed on top of the walker. Quinlan plunged his lightsaber into the armor plating of the AT-TE, meeting resistance but pushing hard to fight it. When he had cut a circular hole in the armor, Vos turned to Aayla, "Come on, we're hitching a ride." Quinlan dropped down the hole into the cockpit of the walker, Aayla followed suit. The pilot of the AT-TE, upon seeing the Jedi, scrambled for his blaster, but Quinlan beat him there, decapitating him with a flick of his wrist. Pulling the driver's limp body from his seat, Vos takes control of the walker. "Get to the guns Aayla, see if you can't do some damage." Aayla nodded in agreement and took control of the weapons systems, picking off clones and launching a concussion missile into a wheeled juggernaught, which exploded into a massive fireball, sending shrapnel flying across the durasteel landing pad. Quinlan, scanning the landing pad for a means of escape, found what he was looking for; he turned to Aayla, "Time to get a new vehicle." Without questioning further, Secura leapt out of the saber-cut hole, followed closely by Vos. Upon landing, Aayla let fly a roundhouse kick, catching a clone in the chest, who doubled over, allowing Aayla to come down on the trooper's neck with her lightsaber's cerulean blade. Both Jedi sprinted across the landing pad, dropping clones with deflected blaster bolts along the way, until they reached their destination, an ARC-170 starfighter. Aayla opened the forward pilot's viewport with the Force, and Quinlan did the same with the main gunner's port. In chorus, the two Jedi sprung into the air, landing in their respective cockpits. Immediately, Aayla began flipping switches and pressing buttons. "You sure you know how to fly this thing?" Quinlan asked half jokingly. Aayla replied bluntly, "Strap down your crash webbing and dial up the inertial compensator, this is gonna be a little rough." With that statement, Aayla kicked the repulsors and slammed the throttle, pulling the ARC-170 into a near vertical climb, ascending into the upper atmosphere. Even with the compensators at 100, Quinlan felt the blood drain from his face at the sudden change of speed and altitude. "Good advice." Quinlan said in response to Aayla's suggestion as he struggled to dial the inertial compensator up to 110. As the starfighter gained altitude, the clouds gave way to green-blue skies, then blackness dotted with stars. "Ready those guns, Quin. We've got company." Aayla reported. Then Quinlan saw what she was referring to. An entire contingent of five _Venator_-Class Star Destroyers awaited them in low orbit, V-19 Torrents and ARC-170s pouring out of their topside hangar bays. Quinlan fired a salvo of laser blasts at the oncoming fighters as Aayla jerked the 170 into wild helix roll to evade the enemy's barrage, and then brought it into a steep descent, luring four V-19s into chase. The Torrents fired proton torpedoes in unison, homing in on the Jedi's 170. In an attempt to lose the torps, Aayla yanked the ARC into sharp starboard turn, directly in the path of a Star Destroyer's bridge. Quinlan fired a torpedo of his own at the unprotected shield generator to the aft and port of the bridge tower, knocking out the _Venator_'s forward defenses. The Star Destroyer's point-defense laser cannons fired wildly at the 170, but the bolts were dodged easily by Aayla's skilled maneuvers. The proton torpedoes began to close in as the 170 closed in on the Star Destroyer's bridge tower. Just as the torpedoes were about to make contact, their homing guidance systems deactivated, and all power was reverted to accelerate them into their target, and in that instant, Aayla wrenched the yoke back with all her strength, sending the 170 into a vertical climb as the torpedoes slammed into the Star Destroyer's bridge at full acceleration, completely destroying it and sending it into a fiery plunge towards Felucia. Leveling out with the planet, Aayla pushed the starfighter's throttle to maximum, rocketing it out of Felucia's mass shadow. Punching in a string of coordinates into the navicomputer with lightning speed, Aayla engaged the hyperdrive. Pinpoints turned to starlines as hyperspace embraced them.

1


End file.
